The activity for the BioSpectrum Awards 2006, the fourth
annual biotechnology industry awards, began in early October. An eminent jury
panel comprising members representing the biotechnology industry, academia and
the public sector was constituted in the first week of October. By virtue of
being the Person of the Year in 2005, Dr MK Bhan, secretary, DBT, assumed the
responsibility of heading the jury panel. Our practice has been that the winner
of the Person of the Year award in the previous year, unanimously becomes the
jury chairperson for the following year's awards.

The jury

The panel consisted of distinguished members like Nitin
Deshmukh, head, private equity, Kotak Mahindra Bank, who has been working
closely with this emerging industry for over a decade; Prof Samir Brahmachari,
director, Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, brought in the academic
perspective; Dr Krishna Ella, CMD, Bharat Biotech, represented the emerging
private sector; and Dr KC Bansal, principal scientist, National Research Centre
on Plant Biotechnology, IARI, brought the views of the research community to the
fore. The two representatives from CyberMedia were Pradeep Gupta, publisher of
BioSpectrum and CMD, CyberMedia and Abraham E Mathew, chief editor, BioSpectrum.
The list of nominations along with the backgrounder of the nominees was sent to
all the panelists via e-mail well in advance and the research support was
provided by the editor of BioSpectrum, N Suresh along with Ch. Srinivas Rao,
associate editor, BioSpectrum.

With the stage set for choosing the biotech champions for the
year 2006, the panel meeting was held at the DBT office in Delhi on October 30.
The jury members had the onerous task of selecting the awardees for the Life
Time Achievement, Person of the Year, Entrepreneur of the Year, and Product of
the Year awards from a list of impressive nominations along with dwelling on the
possibility of a Special Category Award. This award has been given only once in
2003, the year in which the BioSpectrum awards were instituted, to the State of
Andhra Pradesh for its impressive forays in the biotech sector. During 2004 and
2005, the jury had decided against having any special category awards.

Jury deliberations

The jury panel was completely in sync with the selection of
the award winners. Dr RA Mashelkar, director-general, CSIR, was the unanimous
choice for the Life Time Achievement category. "Dr Mashelkar is the perfect
example of a scientist and a policy maker who has reared and nurtured the
biotech industry. He has been a prime mover in the biotechnology segment,"
said Dr Bhan. "This is the appropriate time to honor him as he is
completing his term at CSIR this year," noted Pradeep Gupta.

M Ramasami, managing director, Rasi seeds, which is currently
India's largest Bt cotton seeds company, was chosen the Person of the Year.
This was again a unanimous decision. "Ramasami's contributions to the
Indian farming community have been invaluable. Besides supplying high quality
hybrids in various crops, his company has put the Bt gene in a good background
(cotton hybrid) which had greatly benefited the cotton farmers," opined Dr
Bansal. In just two years Rasi has expanded its Bt cotton seed business to over
Rs 300 crore.

The jury members were in complete agreement with the
selection of Dr Villoo Morawala-Patell, CEO, Avesthagen, as the Entrepreneur of
the Year. She is a first generation scientist-turned-entrepreneur who founded
Avestha Gengraine Technologies, which is focused on the novel concept of
preventive personalized healthcare. "Dr Villoo has set up an impressive
company with a sustainable business plan. She has been successfully forging
alliances and coming up with products," said Nitin Deshmukh.

Before the discussion on the fourth award category, the
Product of the Year award, Dr Krishna Ella, stepped out of the discussion room
as his company's product too figured in the list of nominations. This award
was given collectively to five Reliance Life Sciences products, which the
company recently released. These are AlbuRel, a plasma volume expander;
ImmunoRel, purified immunoglobulin G; ReliSeal, a biological glue and hemostatic
agent; ReliPlasma, inactivated plasma; and HemoRel A, which is the clotting
factor VIII.

Coming to the Special Category award, the jury members chose
Kapil Sibal, minister for science and technology and ocean development, in
consensus for the BioSpectrum Leadership Award in Biotechnology. All the jury
members felt that the minister had gone beyond the call of his duty and given a
stupendous boost to the life sciences sector since taking over as the minister
in 2004. "Minister Sibal is the most articulate and global spokesperson for
the Indian science and technology", said Prof Brahmachari. "He has
promoted the Indian science and technology as a brand and positioned it on a
special platform", added Dr Ella.

In the next few pages, we have tried to capture the
achievements of three remarkable individuals fired by their convictions and
beliefs, a cabinet minister who had passionately championed the cause of Indian
science and a team of scientists, whose dedication saw a number of excellent
biotech products reaching the market in a very short time.